After taking the 2nd of the 3-game set in Target Field Saturday afternoon, one takeaway is clear: Francisco Liriano may finally have his head screwed on straight again, which would be hugefor the Sox going forward.
Liriano really appears to be “at home” in Minnesota. Credit: MLB.com
You can talk about the offense if you want. I mean, it sure was nice to see Adam Dunn return with a 2-3 effort and Paul Konerko smack a 2-run home run, but like I said, the main focus of the game has to be Liriano’s effort against his former team.
Francisco has been struggling with the walks mightily of late, but on Saturday he only issued 2 in 7 innings of work … a total exponentially lower than we’ve seen recently. In fact, Liriano had a no-hitter through 6.2 innings before Trevor Plouffe hit a 2-run shot off of him bringing the game closer at 4-2.
If Liriano can throw effective strikes on a consistent basis, he’s very hard to hit. When the ball is down in the zone for him, he’s got no-hit stuff on any given night. It really did look like he had a good shot at getting his 2nd career no-no for a while there yesterday afternoon.
The Sox need him to keep pitching well over the next couple weeks, as question marks linger over the likes of Gavin Floyd, Dylan Axelrod, and Hector Santiago.
Later today it’s Jake Peavy on the bump for the Sox as they go for the sweep in Minnesota. They’ve owned the Twins all year, so hopefully Jake can dial up some magic and bring his record back to .500 Sunday afternoon.